The Winds of Khalakovo - Bradley P. Beaulieu [102]
She had left Radiskoye with feelings of inadequacy and smallness in the face of what she had seen. She’d had terrible dreams, visions of Ahya being burned alive, of Gierten’s baby girl being swallowed by the earth, and when morning had finally arrived, she had known she would come to remove the stone she had placed beneath Evina. It was a small thing, she knew—Soroush would merely take another if not this one—but it was all she could think to do.
She pulled several of the small opals attached to the inside of the hull off, placing them in a bag affixed to the mast. As the skiff descended, she maneuvered it toward the water, landing it in a clearing between the trees. She headed off toward Gierten’s home. She could hear the sound of the surf to the south. The wind was pleasant, and it brought with it not only the loamy smell of the forest but also memories of the times she had spent with Ahya in places like this, running through the trees and laughing.
She reached the home a short while later. It was squat, with a thatched roof and a gravel path that led from the shoreline to the front of the home. She stepped onto the porch and squinted into the dim interior. With the sun directly overhead it was difficult to see into the room that had only a small window set high in the wall, but she could still see a hearth, a small table, and a rocking chair. “Privyet?” she called.
When no one answered, she walked around to the rear and found Gierten kneeling on a piece of wood, tending to a sickly patch of garden twice the size of their modest home.
Beyond the garden was a well-tended graveyard bordered with a low stone wall. Inside were a dozen cairns, each of them marked with a tall piece of obsidian shaped like Radiskoye’s spire. They held no words of remembrance, but they had a small, uncut chalcedony stone near the top.
Gierten wore a skirt and a man’s shirt, the sleeves of which were rolled up beyond the elbows, revealing grossly thin arms. She was using a wood-handled trowel to pull the weeds among the potatoes and onions. Every so often she gathered enough of the weeds that she would toss them behind her onto a large pile.
Gierten was alone; Evina’s basket was nowhere to be seen.
The cairns... One of them was small, and the earth beneath it was dark, fresh. By the fates, she had come too late.
Rehada began backing away, hoping Gierten wouldn’t notice. She moved one step. Two.
And then a voice spoke from behind Rehada. “What’s this?”
She turned and found a man, perhaps forty, staring at her. His name was Ruslan, and he was Gierten’s husband. She had seen him at the midsummer festivals in Izhny. He wore simple peasant clothes, and a string of small blue mackerel hung over his shoulder.
Gierten turned and wiped her brow with the back of a grimy hand, regarding Rehada with a wholly uncharitable look. Her cheeks were sunken. Her eyes had dark bags beneath them. “What are you doing here?” Her voice was listless and gray.
“I merely came to see how Evina has been faring.” She tried to make it sound as if she didn’t already know that Evina was dead, but she knew it sounded unconvincing.
“She brought the necklace?” Ruslan said to his wife, though he stared hard at Rehada.
Gierten nodded.
Rehada willed herself not to look at it, but she could see a fisherman’s knife within a sheath at his belt. “I’ve made a mistake. Please, I’ll leave. I won’t trouble you again.”
She made for the path, but he stepped in her way. Her heart was pumping madly, and she was just touching the aether to summon her bonded spirit when Gierten grabbed the circlet from around her brow. Instantly her connection was broken, leaving her stomach lurching from the loss of contact.
She felt instantly cold, and her skin prickled along her legs and arms.
Ruslan pointed to the circlet. “It’s forbidden to use them against us.”
“I would not have. I swear to you.”
“You were. It was glowing.”
“I should